East London's Hackney Council is set to vote on a motion to "de-twin" from Israel's Haifa after almost 60 years, in protest against Israel's genocidal war on Gaza. The twinning declaration between the London Borough of Hackney and Israel's third-largest city was signed on July 26, 1968, pledging to encourage "friendly contacts and exchanges between ordinary citizens."
According to the council, the agreement with Haifa has been "dormant" since the COVID-19 pandemic, and the council "will not engage in any twinning activity with Haifa whilst conflict is ongoing." During local elections in May, which saw the Green Party take control of Hackney Council from the ruling Labour Party, the topic of de-twinning from the Israeli city became a key issue. The Green Party has long taken a strongly pro-Palestine stance and has voiced opposition to Israel's war on Gaza.
On Tuesday evening, the council is scheduled to vote on a motion that would terminate the agreement with Haifa and review Hackney's twinning programmes generally. The move has received backlash from Jewish groups in England. According to Hackney Council documents published before the vote, the council has been petitioned to end twinning relations in protest against the war on Gaza and the ongoing humanitarian crisis in the enclave.
In 2024, the Hackney Palestinian Solidarity Campaign submitted a petition to end the twinning partnership. A cross-party motion was again launched in October by the Greens and Hackney Independent Socialist Groups. The council said public calls have only "intensified" since a September report by the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, which accused Israeli forces of breaches of international law and the Genocide Convention.
In the Hackney Greens' manifesto ahead of May's local elections, the party stated: "In Haifa, Palestinian people live under occupation and apartheid by the Israeli state; this is not a city that reflects Hackney's values. Hackney's current and future twinning relationships should reflect our values, rather than undermine them." It pledged to de-twin from Haifa at the "earliest opportunity," undertake a full review of all existing twinning relationships that fail to "uphold equal human rights or participate in apartheid, systemic oppression or genocide," and "explore new twinning models rooted in solidarity."
Phil Rosenberg, president of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, slammed the Greens' motion, calling it "spite over sense." Former Hackney Councillor and Labour MP Luke Akehurst also criticised the motion, saying he was "disgusted by the performative and spiteful gesture politics" from the Greens to terminate the twinning agreement. He noted that Haifa is a famously left-wing city that is a model for coexistence between Jews and Arabs, and the twinning arrangement includes medical exchanges between Homerton and Rambam hospitals.
Source: www.aljazeera.com